Cortisol Augmentation of a Psychological Treatment in Warfighters with Post-traumatic Stress Disorder

ID Number
09-1817

Prolonged exposure therapy (PE) is a cognitive behavioral intervention in which the patient evokes the traumatic memory by talking about what happened, which enables the therapist to provide corrective information to promote thinking that is more compatible with recovery. The PE therapeutic process requires learning, and the purpose of this study is to determine whether a low dose of the synthetic stress hormone hydrocortisone will aid in reducing the symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) when combined with PE presumably by promoting the learning process.